It’s Phi-day again!
The usual excellent puzzle from our regular Friday setter. We found it slightly trickier than expected, possibly due to the inclusion of some longer words and two words we have not come across before. We really liked the anagram at 9 down.
Knowing Phi, there is probably a theme in there somewhere, but we can’t find it – of late that’s not at all unusual. Perhaps someone out there will pick it up?
OUP (Oxford University Press – publisher) in or ‘blocking’ an anagram (‘translation’) of DE GAULlE without or ‘cutting’ one of the ‘l’s (line)
A reversal (‘return’) of WETS (political moderates)
AG (silver) ‘implanted’ in MIC (microphone – ‘audio device’)
An anagram (‘being converted’) of NEAR ‘enveloped’ in MERCY (my goodness, as an interjection)
CLIPS (cuts) in E E (first or ‘initial’ letter of economy, repeated)
An anagram (‘replanted’) of PAUL round RIM (border)
IN + a reversal (‘turning’) of AVON (river) + a reversal of ROT (decay)
A reversal (‘twisted’) of RIB (bone) round or ‘restricting’ E (energy)
A homophone (‘audible’) of CALL (demand)
An anagram (‘flustered’) of HE’S in RUFFLE (upset)
IN (fashionable) SECT (religious group) A (first letter or ‘source’ of anarchy)
GUARd (protection) without the last letter or ‘a lot of’ in S (south) A (America) O (over)
HENCE (accordingly) round SIT (position) A (academy)
O (round) LIVE (as it happens)
The clue suggests that S (first or ‘initial’ letter of sceptical) should go round DUTy (tax) without the last letter or ‘cut’, but ‘on the contrary’ reveals that DUT goes round S
I RIDE (travel) SCENT (track)
An anagram (‘could be’) of RESUMING
AN and AN (articles) round GOLd (precious metal) without the last letter or ‘running short’
ESCAPE (holiday perhaps) + VELO CITY (‘urban cycling hub’ – ‘velo’ being a prefix relating to cycling, as in velodrome etc)
First letters or ‘heads’ of Open Hamburg Museum – a reference to Ohm’s Law in Physics
An anagram (‘misjudged’) of PERHAPS IS round or ‘involved with’ I and R (first letters or ‘touches’ of irony and rodomontade) – new word for us and a lovely example of the definition!
UC (University College) ‘engaged’ in TRADE (business)
WAY (means) LAY (cover)
An anagram (‘appears horribly’) of TO GB IT IS EUROPE
ENTER (record) TrAINER (teacher) without the second letter
DENT (impression) round P (quiet) ONE (individual) – another new word for us
ST (saint) in or ‘entering’ ASSISi (Saint Francis’ city) without the ‘i’
FILE (collection of documents) round RAG (newspaper)
DI (detective inspector) SHED (dropped)
DEN (study) with the ‘d’ (degree) moved to the back or ‘conclusion’
A DNF for me as I didn’t know 18A CAUL: and put MAIL, which only half fits. At 5D I spent ages trying to fit “paraphrases” or “paraphrased”, and only found PERIPHRASIS when I checked a word list to find what else it might be – but what a great clue! Despite which, much enjoyed as usual so thanks to Phi and B&J.
I went for PISHED for 22d, which is a word.
Should have double-checked before posting. PISHED doesn’t mean ‘frustrated’ but DISHED does (which I didn’t know).
Thanks both. I’m with Tatrasman and Hovis above, in having assumed paraphrases would do the job where the outrageous length and construction of the clue rendered me powerless, and having entered DISHED without any confidence it fitted the definition
I found this quite hard going. I did manage to get the never heard of PERIPHRASIS from the intimidating but very appropriate wordplay. Reminds me a bit of the Chambers (app at least) def for “bafflegab” – worth a look if you haven’t seen it.
Called the coin toss between a U and W the wrong way for CAUL and missed out on SAGUARO. Maybe it was possible even though it was new to me, but I wasn’t too disappointed. You win some…
Thanks to Phi and B&J
I was another with paraphrases rather than periphrasis and who can’t spell CAUL. It’s always nice when the wordplay leads you to a word you half remember like DEPONENT. I enjoy imagining Phi’s themes. Today I’m thinking of a petit bourgeois Angolan entertainer involved in a court case in Guadeloupe.
DEPONENT is an example of why Phi is my favorite setter – where a word is new or arcane (for me), the wordplay is (again for me) more self-evident. That said, CAUL defeated me as well. But a worthy PhiDay, which is always the highlight of my solving week! Thanks to him and B&J!
Thanks Bertandjoyce and Phi.
PETIT BOURGEOIS is top fav.
I had unparsed barely plausible WAIL at 18a. Well…
Call it false modesty if you will, but I prefer ‘To Europe it is GB that appears horribly middle-class’ rather than the faintly jingoistic reverse in the clue. A five star clue either way.
Hugely enjoyed all of this. Great mixture of the accessible and the esoteric. Thanks
Solved mostly over a pub lunch but we were held up on 24ac having carelessly tried to shoehorn ‘periphrastic’ into 5dn; once we realised it didn’t fit and had to be PERIPHRASIS we remembered the cactus. PERIPHRASIS, incidentally can also mean the use of an auxilliary verb as in ‘we were solving’ instead of ‘we solved’.
Otherwise pretty well plain sailing and all enjoyable. Favourites were PRIMULA and ESCAPE VELOCITY.
Thanks, Phi and B&J.
But what was the theme?
Ask someone to draw a cactus, and they’ll probably produce a saguaro. Ask them what it’s called and they’ll say ‘cactus’. Curious how something stereotypical can be simultaneously unknown.
No theme today – there’s generally one like that every month. I’d stick with my take on PETIT B, and point you at Jonathan Coe’s new novel Bournville for why that’s such a bad thing.
Knew it was not paraphrases as no I, but I needed a word search for sonething close. New word for me. Knew caul, if you are born in one you will never drown at sea. I lived and still live, in Vietnam now, close to the sea and such superstions rub off.
A very rnjoyable puzzle. I parsed everything, but only after some plumps. The Guardian cryptic had fat finger as a solution the other day, a term I had never heard of, I am suffering from it now. But you know what they say, big fingers, big rooster, or possibly hands. Anyway thanks for crossword and blog.
Anyway H?n g?p l?i
OK, Hen gap lai, dialectics are not recognised